Forge At WalMart Do They Have Everything?
by Lyranfan
Summary: One-shot: written as part of a round robin challenge in yahoo group I just joined


Disclaimer: I don't own the X-Men, X-Men:Evolution or any of its iterations.

This was written as part of a round robin challenge. A bunch of writers suggested different topics and then you got a story from the hat.

**Forge at ****Wal-Mart****Supercenter**** discovers they have everything - almost.**

Forge was typing at a furious rate, keeping to the beat of beat of the music coming from his record player. He had really missed this when he was in Middleverse. Jamming to some groovy tunes of his favorite bands like the Electric Light Orchestra and programming on his Apple II personal computer.

Right now, he was king of the hill – his Apple had 64 kilobytes of RAM and beside it was his brand new 5-1/4" floppy drive – that boss device he was able to type in his programs into, save them and run them later – even after turning off his Apple. What a far out concept. His older Altair computer had to save his programs on paper tape – a serious drag.

From downstairs his mom calls out to him, "Kasovaahe, we need to go to the grocery shopping." [Cheyenne for young man]

He stopped typing for a second. We as in Mom needs to go and she's terrified I won't be here when she gets back. So that means I have to go too.

He tries to stall, "But it's 11 o'clock at night. What store is going to be open now?"

She explains, "I know a place we can go – they have everything you need in a really big store. I need you to come with me to carry the bags."

He types SAVE knowing he has lost this battle. "Okay, Mom. I'll be right there."

Whenever she calls him her young man in her native Cheyenne, he caves to her will. She only used it when she meant business.

He knows if a store is open this late, she wants to go here when it's empty so that she won't lose sight of him among other people. She nearly tore his arm off as she latched onto him in the mall when they went to get some new threads for the upcoming school year. He knew his mom was claustrophobic around big crowds. She could handle small spaces – it was the pushing and shoving people that freaked her out and made her mood ring go dark. She was used to being in open spaces all by herself on the reservation.

As she drives towards the strip mall, Forge was grooving to the music playing from his eight track tape player he installed in her car just before getting stuck in Middleverse. His dad worked hard to keep this car running because the player reminded her of her 'missing' son.

His mom notices they need fuel and pulls into a gas station along the way. He asks "How much should I pump in to fill it – five bucks?" She motions to the credit card reader, "You don't need to see the attendant with cash, this does it all." She puts in credit card and he pumps the gas. As he watches the dollar amount roll by at break neck speed, he wonders, :Since when did light emitting diodes come in colors other then red on black? These black numbers on a light grey background were totally blowing his mind.:

A middle-aged man at the next pump over smiles at the perplexed look on Forge's face, "Can you believe it – two dollars a gallon? I can remember as a kid when gas hit a buck during the seventies OPEC embargo." Forge remembers THAT as just a couple of years ago when gas went over a dollar a gallon and everyone thought it was the end of the world. Where was all the technology that was supposed to replace the combustion engine – battery cars, hydrogen cars, gasahol from the corn grown in the US and his personal favorite – hovercars?

After getting back in the car and his mom starts the engine, he hears nothing – no music. "No, no, no!" That means only one thing - his eight track player just ate his last Eagles tape. As he ejects the tape and sees it has broken - he wishes music could come on a more durable form. He bangs on the tape player, "You stupid jive turkey!"

To distract him from his sorrow, she goes over the shopping list to see if there is anything else he wants. He pouts as he looks out the window, :How about a new friend? For his mom or for him.: He's starting to go stir crazy being in the house all the time.

Since returning to Bayville, he had been to see the X-Men and was hanging out with Kurt – the guy who saved him from Middleverse. But then those stupid dragons invaded the school dance and ruined it for him. His mom panicked and made him swear that he would stay away from the Institute till she was confident things calmed down again.

If he had a new friend, he could get out more and get back up to speed with what's outta sight in technology. If his mom had a new friend, maybe she'd mellow out enough to let him be.

As they walk into the automatic door, his suspicion was right – the store is nearly deserted. And a huge store it is – he has trouble reading the faraway department signs at the end of the aisle that stretches across the complex.

They wander the aisles slowly picking up the items on her list. His mom is much calmer then the other day but she keeps him on a tight leash. He can get five steps away from her before she speeds up the cart to be near him again. They hit a snag when she wants an energy conserving light bulb, not the standard ones in grocery side. He smirks to himself as she mutters about people not caring about Mother Earth. But this means someone needs to go to electrical department.

He pleads with her, "Please Mom, let me go. I'll be right back. I promise."

She knows he wants this – his independence. She lost him once and just can't shake the fear it may happen again. All her tracking skills were useless for those long twenty-two years.

While he was 'gone,' there were days she ate breakfast and would search for him. Then give up hope of ever finding him again. Then search again in the high school grounds. Then swear she wouldn't go back. Then search the neighborhood one more time and stop for lunch when the sun was high. And start it all over again until dinner time.

But she won't be here for him forever. She takes a deep breath and knows she needs to teach him now how to fend for himself in this crazy world. "Five minutes, then I come for you if you're not back."

He smiles and runs off towards the Electrical sign at the far side of the store. He quickly finds the lightbulb and slowly walks back in different direction to get some more exploration in. He was curious what she meant about this place having everything.

He walks by the DVD section and spots a box with a group of penguins on it. His mom LOVES penguins. His dad teased her about the penguin being her spirit guide.

He picks up the box and asks a teenage girl behind the counter if they have the penguin tape on betamax. She looks at him like she has no idea what that is.

A middle aged male clerk pops up from behind the counter where he was doing inventory. Betamax isn't a term he's heard in a long time. He stands and introduces himself, "Hi, I'm Matt. Do you have a VHS or DVD player?" Forge looks disappointed and says, "Uh, we don't have one of those." His mom was suspicious of technology and refused to buy new stuff after he disappeared.

Forge tries something for himself, "How about the Eagles Hotel California on cassette tape?" Matt shook his head no again, "Not really, but we might have it on CD." Forge thought CD was probably for compact disc - that sounds like something Kurt told him about. [see shameless story plug in author's notes at bottom]

Forge's mom pulls up with her cart, relieved to see her son was still here in the store. She takes a deep breath and tries to relax. Maybe tomorrow we'll try ten minutes.

Forge introduces his mom, "This foxy lady here is my mom – this is Matt. He's helping me."

Matt smiles – there it was again. 'Foxy lady' was slang he hadn't heard in a long time. "Nice to meet you, ma'am." He teases her, "He doesn't get out much, does he?" She just smirks and thinks, :You don't know the half of it.: She waits for her son to finish spinning around in his new playground.

Forge wanders towards a tremendous gaming area – Playstation, X-Box, GameCube, Gameboy titles are prominently displayed. He is overwhelmed by the vast collection of games. He whispers, "Jinkies, look at all the psychedelic stuff." He taps a kid one the shoulder, "How much bread is one of these games?" A gang of kids wanders off – wondering what sandwiches had to do with games.

Another middle aged man walks by Forge's mom and greets Matt. He says, "I got the boys all set for setting up the tepees Friday night for the demonstration at the campsite. Just make sure those Indian dancers of yours are up to the challenge of keeping our wild kids entertained." Matt laughs it off, "We'll be the hit of the weekend, I guarantee it."

Intrigued Forge's mom asks, "Indian dancers?" Matt smiles, "Yes ma'am. Our Boy Scout group is trained in the Lene Lenape dances through the Order of the Arrow program – it's like an honor society for campers. I joined as a kid and just never lost my love for it."

Forge's mom offers, "Do you know any Cheyenne Indian dances?" Matt looks at her for a second, getting a closer look at her features and says, "No, ma'am but I would love to meet someone who would be patient enough to teach me and the boys some."

Forge walks back to the guy who seems to know about his time period and gets up the nerve to ask, "Say do you cats have any Apple II games?" Matt laughs and says, "Not for about twenty years. Though I have some at my house. I belong to a group of people who meet once a month – an Apple II user group. Last week we had a gaming session – the old Atarisoft games. Robotron 2084, Pac-Man, Pengo."

Forge's mom blurts out, "Did you say Pengo?" How many quarters did she put in that machine in the pizza parlor she worked at before getting married? She loved that game – that penguin was so cute when he danced after smushing the last snowbird under the ice cube she pushed over it. How long had it been since she and Pengo had done the happy dance together?

Matt smiles and said, "Yes ma'am. I really stink at it but there's a sixteen year old girl who's a wizard at it. The membership in the group has been dwindling since the units have been breaking down. Some really dedicated members still come after their Apples stopped working."

A sixteen year old girl who's good at Pengo, she smiles. She sounds perfect for her Forge. Mom brags, "You tell those people that my son can repair anything. They should bring all their broken machines in and he'll fix them." The teen smiles at the prospect of helping others with his skills. I'm out of the house – finally!

Matt and his mom exchange phone numbers and agree to meet at the Boy Scout campout that weekend.

Forge taps the ice cream they bought for his dad and says, "We'd better be truckin' on before this melts. Check ya later, man." They wave goodbye to Matt who getting in the spirit of things saying, "That'll be dy-no-mite!" and they proceed to the checkout. After leaving the store and packing up the car, both Forge and his mom are excited about meeting Matt.

Forge says, "You know, they don't really have everything I was looking for." His mom cracks a smile and starts singing the Rolling Stones song lyrics as she puts the car in gear:

_You can't always get what you want_

_But if you try sometimes, you just might find _

_You get what you need_

**Author's note**: I'm as old as Forge would be if he was never trapped in Middleverse.

As for the Pengo game – it's one of those cutsie 1970s arcade games made for women to get them to spend money in the arcade. I have a Pengo cartridge for my old Atari 800XL computer that competed with the Apple II and Commodore 64 as home gaming computers long before the present generation of Windows PCs dominated the market place. Women weren't big on shooting aliens or hacking monsters in those days. Recently my wife stumbled on a gadget that had her favorite arcade game called Mappy. You're a police mouse with cats dressed as burglars chasing you in a maze. You make your way around jumping on trampolines that disappear after you jump on them a certain number of times to clear the level. She did the Mappy dance when she picked up the box and we had to buy it right away. I knew how much she loved that game and had actually done a search on Ebay for an old machine. This controller you hook up to the VCR had Mappy and five other games was a lot cheaper.

As for the 70s lingo Forge uses – I found a website with some slang from different decades – 1960s, 1970s and 1980s. And I also have a link to Cheyenne translation site for anyone interested.

A mood ring was this tacky ring with a clear stone and a temperature sensitive bottom that changed color from yellow to green to red – your body temperature was supposed to indicate the 'mood' you were in when you wore it. Mine were usually black – which I never did find out what that meant.

Shameless plug regarding CDs – I have a story on called Shake Your Mutie Thing where Forge 'upgrades' the Danger Room.

Also a plug about store that have everything – for Brotherhood fans, there is a great artist who does a collection of comic strips about the bad boys and the X-Men facing off in a department store.

Forget the www just type – thebrotherhoodclub[dot]deviantart[dot]com


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